The Unimaginable
by inkedinserendipity
Summary: Maui's lost his admirers before. He's lost his hook, almost his own life. He can't imagine losing Moana.


Twenty years.

 _Twenty years_ , says the nameless human that greets you when you swoop down to shore. They're looking at you with sadness in their eyes, saying _twenty years you've been gone._

In retrospect, it should've been obvious. Though you were stuck on that infernal island of yours for a millennia, that number fazed you less than it would a mortal - it's just a couple of centuries, a paltry inconvenience when held up to your thousands of years. And at some point in your thousands of years, after you watched your mother die and your brothers soon after, the family you never really knew, you forgot how tiny a mortal's life was. Just how significant every year is to them. Just how small, how fleeting their lives seemed to you.

Her father thanks you for the coconuts, her mother for keeping her safe. The children fawn over your tattoos and you keep the teenagers enraptured with tales of your adventures. They've heard your stories before from another mouth, but they listen attentively to your telling anyway.

You don't understand just how long twenty years really is until you see Moana.

Sure, her skin is darker, her fingers longer and palms calloused; her spine straighter and her face narrower, cheekbones curving a bit more sharply around her face. That, you anticipated before you landed.

What you weren't expecting to see was stone.

It's an expression you know well, a warrior's face with which you are all too familiar. Even decades later you recognize the way her features lock in place, the way she buries her emotions behind a facade of unfeelingness. Instinct tells you to reach out, elbow her in the shoulder, crack a couple of quips and throw proverbial rocks at her walls until they break for you.

But you tamp down that instinct, because it's not joy she's hiding. There is nothing of the happiness you anticipated upon your reunion, no merriment twinkling at the edges of her eyes.

There's anger there, in the way her jaw jumps. That's fine. You're used to dealing with anger. It's old hat - over the past two decades you've come across it dozens of times, scattered along the islands newly free from the curse of Te Fiti, from mortals that have lost too much to let you go without some scathing retribution.

But the anger's not the worst part. The anger's not what stops you in your tracks and makes you doubt, for the first time, if this really is your Moana.

It's disappointment.

You can see it mixed in with a bitterness that cleaves through you like the sharp rains of the north, cutting through your stomach and piercing right up through your heart. That's what makes you stop, and think, and remember - makes you recall that a year is a long time for mortals. _One year._ Just one year.

She waited twenty.

When she looks at you, you can see every single one lining her face.

There's a long silence, during which you freeze, a smile trying to bloom on your face while you stomp that out too, because her face only hardens at the sight. She scrutinizes you with her chin lifted, her back straight and proud. For a handful of heartbeats she traces the lines of your body, unblemished by youth, regards the new tattoo circling your wrist, and bitterness clouds her face.

She judges your merit and finds you lacking. With smooth, tightly-controlled motions, she turns from you and walks away.

* * *

It's not until later that night that you realize you'd done the same, twenty years ago. You had turned your back on her and flown away. She'd forgiven you then, even though you hadn't really deserved it.

You're not sure she can forgive you again.

The thought drives you from sleep for hours. Though your body, exhausted from days of joyous flying (from anticipating a giddy reunion that did not come), clamors for rest, your mind thinks in circles. Of Te Ka, of Te Fiti, of Lalotai and the Kakamora, of oar-on-hook sparring, of reenacting your own feats with nothing but burnt coconut shells for props. Of Moana, the precious wayfinder who offered you a home.

Two decades ago, before she set her sails toward Motunui, you'd made her a promise. "I won't leave again," you'd vowed, and you'd meant it. You wouldn't abandon her again. Because you knew that pain, you knew the way it ate you from the inside, hunching you over and tearing at your heart like acid.

"I know," she'd said, and she'd smiled at you. The smile that made you feel cherished, the smile that got you through the accusations and fights from mortals who demanded fierce retribution, the smile you held warm to your heart when the nights were too long and cold to weather alone.

You failed her.

You were supposed to protect her, and she was supposed to trust you just like you trust her, and you let her down. You made her feel like she was nothing. You abandoned her.

Oh well, you guess. Like mother, like son.

* * *

Toward her people, Moana is warmth and light, good cheer and smiles with the sort of fond sternness that characterizes the very best of the leaders of old. In her you see the ancient wayfinders, the elders who led entire civilizations with grace. She is an excellent Chief, the best of her age and perhaps even the ones before. You're proud of her despite yourself.

You watch her embrace her mother, laughing, and feel out-of-place at a scene of such familial affection.

You don't belong here.

* * *

You wish you could leave.

You'd be lying if you claimed you hadn't considered it. Just taking off into the night. You could get away with it, too; you could be gone as quickly and quietly as you came. No one would notice.

Running away is, after all, one of your greatest strengths.

Some days you think Moana might even prefer it that way. To not have to look at you again. Because when she does it's a jaded look, full of bitterness and deep disappointment. You've yet to find anything on her island that makes her more unhappy, more off-balance and upset, than you.

You wish you could take her pain away, but demigod though you are, not even you can sway the forces of Time.

You follow that thread of thought one day to Te Fiti, to asking her for a chance to go back, change what was. To return to you the Moana that you knew and loved. To transform this cold bitter Moana to the warm, loving force of good you first knew her as.

Your estimation puts the price at your hook, your life, maybe your mortality. You would do it in a heartbeat. But Te Fiti can no more change the past than you can. Not even the Goddess of Life holds such sway over an element as wild, as unpredictable as Time.

So to this strange unmoving stasis you return. You toy with the idea of leaving again once or twice, of forsaking this discomfort for the freedom of the open skies, bouncing it off your tattoo as you sit in the shade of the coconut grove. Mini-Maui humors you only because he knows you would not go.

You can't leave. You can't. So you stay.

* * *

You try to talk to her. You're are rebuffed with walls of icy politeness and stiff kindness, a sort of cold dignity that stings like anger.

This new Moana speaks to you, no longer with love, but with anger. With hatred.

* * *

Mini-Maui points out that Te Fiti can no more turn back time than you can, but you shrug him off and decide to ask anyway. You tromp down to the shore and set yourself about to asking the Goddess of Life to go back.

You're not really one for praying. You tend to work alone. When you perform your feats, you do them without help. Centuries of solitude have made it kinda difficult for you to ask for aid.

But you're desperate, here. And besides, flying solo is a taste that you've recently found turned sour - now that you've found someone you'd actually trust to have your back, you kinda want to keep her.

You're just not sure how to show that to her. You've tried talking, joking, laughing, initiating heartfelt conversations, everything you can think of. You blame these failures your emotional ineptitude. Because you're not a man of words. You're really not. You're a lot better at actions - fighting, boasting, performing _hakas_. But she's in no danger, there's nothing you can do for her, and she would actually be quite content, you think, without you here.

Perhaps it would be best if you left. But you can't go until you show her, somehow, how much you regret not returning sooner. How much you miss her.

Gods, you miss her.

Most people pray kneeling. You would know, since you're typically on the receiving end. But you'd term yourself a more casual prayer-giver - Te Fiti knows you personally, surely she won't be too offended if you decide to make yourself comfortable while pleading with her to turn back the clock.

"…just thinking, y'know, it'd be nice to give it another shot. Twenty years or so, that's all I'm asking." You scuff your feet along the sand and through your mind flickers the dozens of islands you've been teaching to sail for the past two decades and even before then, before Moana, the adoring crowds who showered you in affection for keeping their island safe. How stupid you were, thinking that was the type of love you craved. "There are a couple things I would go back and change, you catch my drift?"

Ha, drift. Like a current. Maybe the ocean joke will be enough to appease her.

…No, that joke's weak even for you. You cross your arms over your knees and stare out at the horizon, and no you're not moping, whatever your little inkstain might think otherwise.

"C'mon," you say, bargaining to the long horizon line. "What about my hook? It's a fine-quality specimen, really. All pure white bone, intricate carvings, and oh yeah, godly powers." You drum your fingers against the handle. "Not that I don't appreciate it, but I'd, uh, really like a second shot at this whole timeline thing."

No response. Oh, that's just typical. Trust the gods to ignore one of their most prestigious creations.

"I can do you one better," you say, even though you're mostly blowing off steam at this point because if Te Fiti's even bothering to listen to you she's giving no response. "Mortality. That's a big thing. Huge thing. Means I'm gonna die. You want that? Yeah, you like, feed off of life. It's tempting, isn't it?"

You waggle a hand toward the ocean, then let it fall back to your side. There's nothing. Not even the slightest shifting of currents that means the ocean's eavesdropping.

Even though you knew she probably wasn't going to say anything, it still hurts. This was one of your last hopes, and you're frankly not sure what you're going to do. Your frustration boils over and you kick a stone angrily into the ocean. It lands firmly in the sand and you succeed only in stubbing your toe, then swearing as you land flat on your back. As you hit the ground, there's a small snort behind you.

It's a laugh you haven't heard in a long, long time.

You're back on your feet in a heartbeat, kinda staring out at the ocean, not turning around because you're not sure what your face is doing right now, and you're also not sure if you want to see what hers is doing, if she will still be jaded and disappointed when you look.

But your curiosity is legendary and has always been unbearable so you turn, slowly, a knot of dread twisting in your stomach, the likes of which you haven't felt in - well, two decades, actually, since the barrier around Te Fiti came into view with wind rustling beneath your wings. You turn, and you're looking at Moana.

Not the cold Moana. Not the one who rebuffed your attempts at cheer and conversation with chill and contempt. Not the one who turned from you and deemed you unworthy.

No. This is your Moana, and she's smiling.

She's smiling at _you_.

"Moana?" you ask, and her name comes out more like a whisper, sounding more like a prayer than any of your words of earlier.

"Yeah," she says. Not _yes_ , not the _hello_ of a Chief - just _yeah_.

And then she gives a tiny little wave, a mischievous grin curling up the edges of her face, and you can feel your own face crumple in on itself.

You long to move forward, to sweep her up from the sand and into your arms because it's been too long, and for the first time you think you understand something of the twenty years that had pressed down on her shoulders and made her hard, hard like the unforgiving rock that splits the sea.

For the first time in twenty years, she looks at you and it's soft, and it turns out you don't have to leap forward at all because she takes care of it for you.

She doesn't a leap. There's no running start. Instead, she walks forward along the beach, footsteps measured and even, until she's right in front of you. Then she wraps her arms around you and holds you as you sink to the ground.

You bury your face in her shoulder, staring disbelievingly at the sand. Twenty years it's been, twenty long years, and it's only now that you realize just how much you _missed_ this. This acceptance and warmth, the sort of comfort that only Moana can provide.

Warm and nestled against her, you let your eyelids slip closed and relax into the feeling of her arms around your back.

* * *

Your hug doesn't last long enough. That's probably because it could last thousands of years and not be long enough, but the point still stands.

Both of you apologize at the same time. You tell her she has nothing to apologize for. She doesn't reciprocate the sentiment, but that's okay.

The road to forgiveness is a long one, you know better than most - but the first step is the hardest.

* * *

Slowly, as the two of you trickle back into normalcy, you realize that the Moana of earlier was not truly Moana. Sure, she had smiled and laughed, but that is nothing on her now.

Now, it seems like her exuberance can hardly be contained. Where she walks she hums, and there's a twinkle in her eye that lights up the _fale tele_ when she enters. She jabs you in the shoulder when she jokes, and she practically bounces along the shoreline as she shows you the newest additions to Motunui, the groves and the ports and the fleets.

It's you. You've done this. You've wrought this change in her.

You think back to the soft smile she gave you, the one you kept close to you during those long years before returning to Motunui, and realize that you're proud of yourself.

There's no tattoo for this feat, but you watch Moana tend to her village, bursting with affection and joy, and of this you are more proud than any of your godly feats.

* * *

One of your birds, a small _ti'otala_ , tells you that an island up north islands is being terrorized by a spirit of Pulotu.

Moana knows you must leave before you say a word. She sees it in your eyes.

"I'll be back soon," you promise, and she nods.

* * *

As soon as the beast is vanquished, you fly as fast as your wings can take you back to Motunui. You don't think you're imagining the relief in her eyes when she spies your silhouette against the sun.

* * *

Three months have passed since that fateful evening you decided to pray to Te Fiti. Your face is familiar among the crowd of fishermen, a welcome and lively distraction from the humdrum of waiting for the fish to bite. The children clamber up your shoulders like they would one of your coconut trees; the adults of the village know you by name, and you know most of theirs.

Moana comes to you sometimes, after a nightmare. It helps. It helps both of you.

* * *

As a demigod, you've never been much one for crying. You've faced down death hundreds of times and laughed, because what is death in the face of an immortal like you? There is little that frightens you and even less that sparks change in you.

Moana is one of these rare, precious things. She is one of the few factors in your life that can tear you down, build you up, break you to pieces in as many words. It's dangerous, loving a mortal as much as you do Moana, but you love her anyway.

The night she tells you she forgives you, you cry.


End file.
